Just over 2 years ago, a gift arrived by email. One of my dearest friends from high school reached out to say that I’d been the wellspring of his writing career. We’d not spoken in 30 years. I knew well of his success, and in my heart I felt deep shame about my chronic health problems. We reignited our friendship immediately online, then met in person a few times, and this was all part of the personal growth process that led to life in the liminal spaces at Little Prince of Oregon.
To show his thanks, when I reach out, he’s there. I think a lot about what it means to be a wellspring. I think often that my constant tears must be at play somehow lol. At heart I am a poet and writer too, but practicing has not been easy, though it’s easier now with him out there. I can write about something I’m struggling with, and he sends me a reading list. I love this process more than I can express. I’m proud of him and am envious he’s able to teach others. Many of my friends from long ago are professors now.
I’ve not yet read everything he’s written. It’s strange to read the literary work of someone you know, but this is one of several of his pieces that have appeared in The New Yorker and if you wish, you can even chose to hear him read it here, or you can read it on your own: The Poem Said. It’s fun for me to hear him read it. We woke up into our creative selves together as teens. He’s living the dream.
When we met in Philadelphia at a coffee shop 2 years ago, I told him about my love of ferns, and my inability cognitively to learn as deeply about them as I want to. Later, he sent me the poem OK Fern by Maureen N. McLane. (Scroll down to the second poem.) I still chuckle that he has a poem to send me for everything and it always makes me feel calmer. Some friends just know you so well.
We talked at great length about garden writing, garden literature, and nature in other literary works. I told him how irked I get when writers miswrite the plant information. We just laughed. If I never become more technical, he’d care for me all the same.
The poetry right now in my daily life is my work, and it’s the carpets of plants. It’s the rhythm of my movements, the actions of others, Spanish floating on the air, the atmosphere of the pounding raining, the wind, the silence, the heat, the cold, all compounded and amplified by the light. I can hear now the sound of the plastic walls rolling up as the temperature goes up, and can feel the cool air as it seeps into my skin.
Months into work now at LP, another fun conversation took place with a friend at the NW Flower and Garden Festival two weeks ago. A respected horticulturist and plantsperson was talking about my job with me at dinner, and about how wonderful it was for me to work hard learning about growing “while working on the other things”.
This was funny to me, and I nodded saying it’s nice to be disciplined, looking at roots, and if I see pests, disease, or plant growth issues I can “dial a friend” and we work it out. He added that was a nice way to use my intelligence and I thought it was funny because I don’t feel like I’m using my knowledge that much, but yes, I am. And I enjoy the time alone.
Lost in the liminal spaces though, I dance listening to music, or else I listen to audiobooks. I sat there at dinner wondering what the “other things” I’m working on are, and I thought about explaining the nothingness that I get lost in, but I left the mystery of it all on the table, beautifully arranged, and not there at all. Words in the air.
Most of the photos I have are not blog worthy. They’re questions I have about how things are growing, a discolored leaf, an insect. I bring them home and think them over, looking them up. I add the information to a spreadsheet, I drift off.
Adjusting to this new life is still causing a great deal of impatience for me. Both of the people above are well aware that I’m working through medical PTSD—as are my closest friends—and it’s something I write about, but I’ve not been clear about my learning deficits and emotional dysregulation. I’ve just used a broad brush and been emotional about it.
This has all been something I’ve felt like I’ve had to work hard to hide. My own experience of trauma has dramatically hindered my ability to acquire technical knowledge for years. A hyperactive amygdala and a compromised hippocampus disrupt encoding and recall. I spent decades in fight or flight mode. I struggle to concentrate and neutral information is not an emergency, so it just doesn’t stick in my mind. I have a narrow window for any kind of distress, and my brain still prioritizes safety over learning. Just getting up and going about a normal day is still cognitive overload for me after being dependent on being housebound. I no longer dissociate at least, and my mind is far less foggy. But I still have bad days. This Wednesday it took 4x more energy and focus to go to work than the 3 days before and I am not sure why other than to say I was exhausted.
So work for me is still not as technical as I want the experience to be. I’m in a safe environment, with supportive coworkers who communicate well. I’m building skills slowly, using repetition, and am starting to utilize more active learning. I still have decreased cognitive flexibility, and reduced executive functioning, but I’ve at least seen improvements in both areas. I feel disabled and handicapped by all of this, and I often wonder if that will ever end and I can be a “real boy” like Pinocchio.
Who would I have been? I know I shouldn’t ask that, and I shouldn’t think it, but it is always there. All I know is that my writing companion came back for me, and is there to support whatever I need to do.
Speaking has it’s hiccups too, but I keep at it. I remember still a time before when these issues were not so labor intensive. I don’t expect to be that young again, but I’d like for this to feel more effortless. Others make it look so easy. I find myself frequently exasperated, but again, I have improved over the last few years.
Self-compassion has not been easy for me. I’ve been impatient, and often cruel to myself. This has been a frustrating process to go through. But it is like anything else in the passage of time, through the changing seasons. I’ve had my personal ups and downs, and this spring I’m excited for new beginnings, even if it means I have to wait to feel better still, to keep hiking up that mountain in order to be able to work through more complex cognitive work.
In the meantime, I can rip out, chop up, burn, (maybe even blow up), anything I don’t want to keep around me. I’m trying hard to disrupt the life I’ve known to make way for anything new.
I just need to keep working through the moments of hyperarousal, the fear of suddenly getting ill again, and the daily management of inflammation. No big deal lol. My health will always be my other job. It’s no wonder I’m so tired. I know.
Overall I’ve worked hard on building my self-efficacy in horticulture and I’m excited to work more on the “other things” my friend mentioned above. I think I know what he meant, and that’s returning to work I did when he met me, working with seeds, the same thing he does, in the way I want to more than anything right now. I just need to clear out space at home, and find the time to return to my heart’s work.
Ann Loves Plants 
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